Among the other options Unicredit board members may discuss is the possibility of selling the bank's stake in Generali via a convertible bond due to expire in December, and of putting the bank's stake in Italian highway operator Atlantia SpA up for sale as well, the people familiar with the matter said.

Those with whom the author has come in contact, however, have, without exception, been mercenary and cold-blooded men, to whom the name highway robber could be applied with far more justice than the higher sounding term.